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fatal error

Level advice

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Since most of my mods are newbie stuff I figure to better make stuff that the doom community will like i need advice. (shoulda though of this sooner.) So what exactly are you guys looking for in you levels and stuff?

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fatal error said:

Since most of my mods are newbie stuff I figure to better make stuff that the doom community will like i need advice. (shoulda though of this sooner.) So what exactly are you guys looking for in you levels and stuff?


Well, from playing your wads I see a lack of doors, and to be honest, do you know how to make them? If not you can just do YouTube search, same with teleporters, lifts, etc.

If you want, I have some levels I would like to put into a megawad project (my area51 levels) and if you want to contribute some levels and help me make a megawad, your more then welcome.

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Some advice:

We don't always appreciate Linear/Symmetric maps, we need a difference with out too much Linear.

Stick to a theme you may find useful, for they might like Hell or Tech Base, or Cavern types.

Limit on the big monsters in a map, they may be awesome and add difficulty, but too many is alittle out of hand. IE- Nuts.wad .

Start on your best quality, if one says it sucks, they suck too, but if one says there's improvement, they are correct. -constructive criticism-

For Editor wise, Doom Builder 1 or 2 (depending on your OS) is the best, but some of the older members have the use of Wintex, DeePSeA...

For implementing non-Doom, or even Doom graphics, XWE, it can put in a new music sound instead of regular MAPx/ExMx music.

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Like mithral demon said find a good theme. A good map can make its own theme but it's easier to decide on a theme or a few themes for rooms. Practice making a few MARBLE or STARTAN rooms with things like SUPPORT3 and METAL2 for braces. Check out this thread for some texturing tips.

Limit on the big monsters in a map, they may be awesome and add difficulty, but too many is alittle out of hand. IE- Nuts.wad .

I know nuts.wad is insanely overboard in monster population, but there's no perspective in comparing it to much else. I'd rather give scythe 2 MAP28 as a good example of a slaughter map but there's no WAY I'd put as many revenants on those ledges into a medium-sized techbase.

Also wintex is more a data movement/converter program than a map editor =/ Unless I'm thinking of the wrong program ...

[offtopic] hey avery I'm doing something that 'might' be close to that with my bunker hill~Area42 thread maps, maybe collaborate and make a megawad? [/offtopic]

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Take your time.

You released Time Warp 1 through 4 in what seemed like the same week. It was obvious that they were rushed, and nobody likes that. Take time to think about where you want to go with your level, how you want it to progress etc..

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avery1555 said:

Well, from playing your wads I see a lack of doors, and to be honest, do you know how to make them? If not you can just do YouTube search, same with teleporters, lifts, etc.


Well in my defence i can make doors, lifts, teleporters ect. In fact time warp 4 has many of these, in waterworks teleporters are more common.

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fatal error said:

Well in my defence i can make doors, lifts, teleporters ect. In fact time warp 4 has many of these, in waterworks teleporters are more common.

Then perhaps you should use more of them? Keep your fights more contained, allow the player to fall back if needed to hide behind a door for a bit.

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As I said in my reviews of TW3 and 4, "quality over quantity". You really need to spend more time on your maps. All of your levels are way too short, and have boring rectangular architecture. Not saying they have to be huge maps that take hours, but they should take more than 10 seconds. Episodes 2 and 4 are good metrics of how long a Doom level should be, IMO.

Also please stop with the Nazi themes and lava textures as exits, use real exit switches. I know you know how, you did use one for a level in TW4.

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fatal error said:

Well in my defence i can make doors, lifts, teleporters ect. In fact time warp 4 has many of these, in waterworks teleporters are more common.


Use teleporters sparingly. A gameplay progression reliant mostly on teleporters is almost always messy and awkward. To build the illusion of a coherent space, you can have vantage points that look out over other parts of the map without allowing you to actually get there yet.

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fatal error said:

Since most of my mods are newbie stuff I figure to better make stuff that the doom community will like i need advice.

Do what you like an ignore what the community likes, it works for me.

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Well fatal error, I played Time Warp and found myself beating levels in less then 30 seconds, maybe expand a bit (a lot) more?

Also, Its hard to determine where the exit is when its a gigantic wall texture, so maybe use normal exit switches please.

Maybe redo Time Warp 1 and make the levels longer, and improve on what people have said in here. It would be cool if teleporters lead to the past instead of giant magma walls.

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avery1555 said:

Maybe redo Time Warp 1 and make the levels longer, and improve on what people have said in here. It would be cool if teleporters lead to the past instead of giant magma walls.


Time warp 1 was the second thing I ever made. lets forget about it.

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First of all, I will always play a map if it looks pretty. It's a good way to get people interested. Here's how to achieve this:

(1) Good Color/Texture Choices: If you have a consistent color theme throughout a map, well aligned textures and no "clashes" (rant: WHY THE FUCK DO PEOPLE THINK GREEN AND RED MARBLE GO TOGETHER???) You can make a good looking map on that basis

Here are some good (albeit overused) color themes:
Brown/Grey/Red - Good for gothic maps, add some orange in for a flair. See The Ultimate Torment and Torture.
Dark Green/Beige/Light Brown/Tan - Good for more earthy themes, light blue added to this makes a good sky/water color. See Suspended in Dusk.
Silver/Grey/Blue - Good for Skybase and Space station levels, works great with a really dark starry sky. See Eternal Doom, Map01. or that one space station map in Deus Vult.
Make your own! - Find some color swatches, look ata color wheel. What colors go well together and don't clash?

(2)Having good detail doesn't mean you have to be Tormentor667. Excellent ways of adding detailing can be: add windows, add borders, make different lighting schemes, high ceilings and low lights, ask anyone here for more detailing tricks.

(3) lots of height variation can be a problem (see any of TimeOfDeath's maps and you'll get what I mean) but if used well (like say, Deus Vult 2) you can create some really beautiful architecture.

(4)Square Rooms, Connected with Square Hallways, Connected by Square Staircases, with Square windows and Square passages aren't attractive at all. Circles are sexy.

(5) Atmosphere. Creating a good atmosphere in a level makes it even better. Having a pyramid/space station/hell level may be cool, but the atmosphere may be confusing. Also, music can make or break the atmosphere.

Now, if a map looks nice, but doesn't play well, I wont even bother to finish it, so here's how to make well playable maps.

(1)Movement. The most important thing about ANY game is that movement feels realistic and fluid. If I have to frantically move my mouse left and right in a small map, there's a problem. Design the level so that the player feels good moving about. 8x8 Pillars also kill movement, should be avoided at all costs.

(2)Gunfights. Gunfights need to be challenging and have a lotta room to move about. See Plutonia Map01. A good gunfight is one in which you move around a lot and deal with multiple targets, perhaps on higher or lower ground. Putting places that offer cover is always good for a map with a big gunfight.

(3)Location, Location, Location. Again, a map with different heights and variations throughout not only looks good, but makes for interesting gameplay. Shooting a crowd of zombies from the top of a curving staircase offers more challenge than shooting a crowd of zombies in an open field.

or maybe Tl;Dr

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fatal error said:

Time warp 1 was the second thing I ever made. lets forget about it.


Don't be so sure, sometimes its better to go back and realize what you did wrong instead of grasping a whole new concept.

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Patrick said:

(1) Good Color/Texture Choices: If you have a consistent color theme throughout a map, well aligned textures and no "clashes" (rant: WHY THE FUCK DO PEOPLE THINK GREEN AND RED MARBLE GO TOGETHER???) You can make a good looking map on that basis


Sometimes you can make a really good map based on textures that clash.

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Torn said:

Sometimes you can make a really good map based on textures that clash.


Good point. But generally speaking, this is usually not the case.

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Mithral_Demon said:

Well, if you look at Final Doom which in fact HAS Doom 1 midi music in it, though it was through company... I'm guessing it's legal.


I was thinking a long those lines as well. There both doom, but to avoid conflict I had to ask.

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Id takes each DOOM game as a separate product, even if they belong to the same franchise, and gives permission to use some resources from the game you are modding in your mod, but not from other games.

The Casali brothers had permission to use whatever they used in Plutonia, as id published their WAD, but that's no indication of what independent modders can do.

While it is copyright infringement, taking one or two MIDIs from one game and putting them in the other might not be so bad, but if you're thinking of using a lot of DOOM's music, you're better off just making your WAD for DOOM.

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myk said:

Id takes each DOOM game as a separate product, even if they belong to the same franchise, and gives permission to use some resources from the game you are modding in your mod, but not from other games.

The Casali brothers had permission to use whatever they used in Plutonia, as id published their WAD, but that's no indication of what independent modders can do.

While it is copyright infringement, taking one or two MIDIs from one game and putting them in the other might not be so bad, but if you're thinking of using a lot of DOOM's music, you're better off just making your WAD for DOOM.


Ah...

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myk said:

and gives permission to use some resources from the game you are modding in your mod,

Is there a solid definition on "some", or is it more of a common sense thing?

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The EULA refers to "certain textures and other images". That is, I would say, modify and include the portions you need for your add-on, as long as the pieces are from the game and the mod requires the game to run, as opposed to the whole thing or redundant materials.

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The earlier EULA is a bit different and says "you may create a map editor, modify maps and make your own maps" instead of that thing about images. I would take it as a general "under the stated conditions, you may modify certain lumps," in either case, regardless of the type of lump you are modifying, instead of "you can't modify the other types, just levels/graphics." I think that in the new EULA they wanted to clarify that you can modify the graphics as long as they require the game, as people in the past had been skeptical about whether you could, as they hadn't been mentioned. And in the early days the main form of modification was map editing and design, which might explain why they didn't think about mentioning what you could do with any other lumps back then.

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I don't see why they would need to specify in a EULA that you can make your own maps. Sure, specify that you can modify theirs, but building mods for any product is implicitly legal. Well, maybe not in the US, hehe. The DMCA smacks everybody in the face with DRM. Evil bastards.

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You need to know how to make the maps, which requires technical knowledge that's part of (based on) their compiled program and data file. Under "intellectual property" conceptions of copyright, messing with a program by reverse engineering or the like can be considered an infringement. That EULA in fact prohibits reverse engineering, hence providing the level editing permission as an exception to that (starting with "Notwithstanding the foregoing".) Back then they also had a special license for WAD editing utilities, the "Data Editor License," presumably to give them a chance to oversee what kind of hacking was going on and to have a concrete way to say No to anything they objected to.

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Has a restriction against reverse engineering software ever been enforced in America? Even the DMCA appears to allow breaking encryption for the purpose of tools like map editors, matching protocols, etc.

What I really don't get is why write in a blanket restriction on reverse engineering and then allow separately for all the same things it would accomplish. Seems retarded.

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Aliotroph? said:
Has a restriction against reverse engineering software ever been enforced in America?

It's based on the concept of derivative works. If it can be shown that one work wouldn't exist without the other as a specific (even if partial) starting point (a "base"), the former is touching on the copyrights of the latter. Judges and juries in a case of this sort still have to keep an eye on whether what was used as a result of the reverse engineering is within copyright, whether it's just a concept or if its publicly available information or uses an actual copyrighted portion of the work (modified or otherwise; not just as "cut and paste").

Demanding as a copyright holder that others don't reverse engineer is also the opposite of what share-alike licenses do. One says "don't look in that complied stuff and don touch it" and the other "always include what's in there in an editable format so others can mess with it."

What I really don't get is why write in a blanket restriction on reverse engineering and then allow separately for all the same things it would accomplish.

If you were to reverse engineer the game and then release an application that uses the reverse engineered data to do something other than what's given as an exception (which is WAD editing to make add-ons), such as creating a similar game or stuff that doesn't depend on their game, id could point out they never gave you permission to do it.

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